Yes the StarVR looks interesting, but not interesting enough to be worth 10x what I paid for my early bird Pimax 8k (converted to a 5k+). The bigger question will be what this recently rumored Valve unit will have for specs and when it will be released (if ever). A 140 degree FOV with great panels from Valve would be a killer proposition, especially at a$500 price point.

If they sell units to reviewers like sweviver its obvious they want the “prosumer” market. Time will tell. At least these units are ready to ship. We should have reviews anytime soon

Everything I have heard from StarVR has indicated that they are focusing on enterprise but are still interested in prosumer. I would say that their focus at this point is on getting all the developer’s software working properly so they can have a large pool of content ready on release.

RANT INCOMING (NON-PIMAX)

Releasing without content can absolutely kill your product - just look at the Wii U. It flopped because they didn’t release any games that people actually wanted to play. You need to have either good exclusives or the best version of games/multiplayer in order to sell anything and they didn’t offer that. They offered low resolution ports with P2P hosting for online play but they could have stayed relevant if they offered the Nintendo exclusives that everyone loves.

The Switch started flying off shelves when they released Zelda: Breath of the Wild. If you compare the top selling games for the Switch (out for 1.5 years) to the Wii U (out for 6 years) the Switch has sold twice as many copies, even though they were generally the same type of games (ie new releases/sequels of Nintendo exclusives). The main difference is that they released Switch games when the console was still relevant.

RANT OVER

TLDR; If you don’t give people good content within a reasonable period of time, then you won’t sell anything.

That is great news. These guys will be our “guinea pigs”…the ones who take a chance and see whether or not this headset will live up to the hype. To those of you who have already been accepted, congrats and my hats off to you. Please giveb us your reviews and impressions, and as a racing sim fan, if it’s at all possible PLEASE test out PCars 2, Asetto Corsa and Iracing.

It’s good to hear the pioneers of proper Gen 2 VR (eye tracking, super wide FOV, spotless) are gearing up for the “big game” of business.

However, I am uncertain as to how useful a StarVR will be for a super-high-end consumer.
1.Eye tracking and foveated rendering - this will have to be supported by the software regardless of the hardware. But I have faith that OXR will eventually implement a fully applicable solution.
2.VR SLI - which StarVR supposedly supports - the same as eye tracking - needs to be supported by software as well as hardware.

I feel early adoption of this super-high-end VR by consumers and enthusiasts at this point, might be a little premature. As I don’t think there will be much to enjoy on it for some time. Developers are definitely the ones who need to get their hands on them first, to drive the industry forwards. But, I hope it’s not too far into the future until this kind of VR is available for an “affordable” price for consumers, at which time, the palette of software that supports all the features should be more expanded. Crossing my fingers for OXR and whatever other open VR standards come out. Though I hope everyone can agree on a single one, and not do the exclusionary closed system that a certain other brand is…

I agree with your general view - on this particular statement I assume you are referring specifically to the eye-tracking and SLI capabilities ? If yes, fully agree.

But if you are referring to the StarVR One in general, I think that would not be true because in all lieklihood it will support at least a number of SteamVR games and the resolution, as has been established, is actually less than overwhelming, so any better GPU can support it.

Only coming in at a price point which doesn’t make sense for us poor beggars, but not a solely an academic use device for the tech geek. Unlike the 8K(x), which could end up being a limited use device if provided exactly as advertised - its resolution would be too much to deal with for the current GPUs, if you wanted to play the usual games we are keen to experience in VR. And of course you can go with SS of 0.3 or 0.4 but that may end up looking rather unimpressive.

Axacuatl…you are incredibly correct and I agree 100% percent with what you say. It’s a real dilemma for me because I’m seriously SERIOUSLY jonesing to play Assetto Corsa, Iracing and PCars 2 in the StarVR One with foveated rendering and full 210º FOV. If only these three games would work I’d be the happiest man alive and would buy the headset ASAP.

Sadly, this is the real world and it’s painfully obvious that will not fully take advantage of these features out of the box(well, maybe PCars will, seeing as how SMS is one of their partners). However, developers like Kunos will in all likely-hood not have any interest in patching StarVR support into AC, especially now, that they’re focusing mainly on ACC(a game I’m really not interested in and don’t see it doing that well IMHO).

With Iracing on the other hand, I could see them potentially being persuaded to give the game full StarVR support if someone offered to send them a unit. David Tucker, one of the devs, is a really cool guy, and many people consider him a real down to earth open minded individual, who is open to discussing new ideas to make things like VR better in the game. I would be willing to buy a StarVR and send Iracing my unit, if it meant having them patch in foveated rendering support, VR-Link SLI and the full 210º FOV.

I know I’m rambling but I really just want these three games to work badly, and then I’ll have no problems justifying getting a Star VR One. Hopefully those of you getting units now will give us your impressions on these games, especially Iracing and AC.

If only these three games would work I’d be the happiest man alive and would buy the headset ASAP.

But would you ? I would expect the desire for a better headset than, say, the $299 Samsung Odyssey to be fueled by 2 distinct factors: you want more resolution to see more detail and peripheral awareness. In that order. Peripheral awareness will be there, absolutely. But more detail ?

Now let’s assume that foveated rendering and SLI work - yeah, PJC2 will look better because you can tune up the settings massively, true but still you will not see the details you are longing for in the far bends so that might end up being a mixed bag`. The real beef would be in pushing the SS. Otherwise you get nicer reflections and the usual graphical gimmicks, which I would like but a real simracer probably cares less about because he is all about competitiveness, and at that stage ‘nice graphics’ don’t count, only seeing details earlier is relevant.

Only 16% more pixels to render. With a 2080TI you won’t be needing foveated rendering anyway. But yeah I share @Axacuatl’s concern over the relatively low resolution. Desperately awaiting some real review from people having the HMD at home.

Then again, while thinking of it, maybe it’s not that bad since it’s full RGB. The Vive pro is pentile so I guess you could say the effective resolution is 74% higher than the Vive Pro (which,you could say, is ‘fake’ 1600x1400 since it’s missing subpixels and needs to subsample them).

But still, that’s spread over 90% more FoV, so either way, it’s safe to say that it’s not going to be as sharp as the Vive Pro

Should possible look on par or maybe-maybe better than vive pro with the Rgb-W oked?

How do you mean? In my previous post I calculated 16% more pixels, but because of the extra subpixel multiply that with 50% so 74% total higher resolution. Yet over 90% more FoV that’s not going to be as sharp as the Vive Pro.

Ah, in my calc I assumed 210 diagonal. I also still want to see that it’s really horizontal, almost can’t believe it since some reviewers said they can still see edges on the left and right. Although I think Sebastian said he didn’t see them.